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These news clips on global space news are provided by the Coalition for Space Exploration for distribution by the Space Foundation to our constituents. You can also subscribe to receive a daily email version.

CSExtra – Tuesday, March 20, 2012

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Tuesday’s CSExtra offers the latest reporting and commentary on space-related activities from across the globe. Astronauts on long duration space missions face a new health obstacle. A mild winter fades to spring. Virgin Galactic adds actor Ashton Kutcher to its passenger list. Essays examine new ties between researchers and commercial suborbital space travel and a French proposal to replace Europe’s Automated Transfer Vehicle. A once acclaimed U.S. space scientist faces prison for espionage. The moon’s changing chemistry. The AIAA visits the Hill. In Virginia, a skirmish over the future of federal land near a NASA launch site. Buzz Lightyear retires to the National Air and Space Museum.

A. From the Houston Chronicle: Houston has quietly established itself as a world leader in space medicine, top NASA and regional medical experts note Monday, as they mark the official opening of a new National Science Biomedical Research Institute adjacent to the Texas Medical Center and Rice University. Efforts to keep astronauts healthy during long duration missions are also paying dividends for terrestrial medicine through the NASA funded NSBRI. http://www.chron.com/default/article/Area-researchers-work-to-keep-astronauts-in-space-3419230.php

4. Two essays from Monday’s The Space Review examine the prospects for research as a market for suborbital rocket companies and choices facing the European Space Agency over a prospective replacement for the Automated Transfer Vehicle.

A. In “Suborbital Gets Serous,” TSR editor Jeff Foust spots a promising but struggling trend to merge scientists with commercial suborbital spaceflight. NASA is underwriting early flights for experiments, but the industry will need scientists with funding from other sources to secure the industry. Doubters say wealthy space tourists are the chief market. http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2048/1

B. In “Toward a European Multitask Space Vehicle,” Paul de Brem, a journalist, examines a French proposal to replace the European Space Agency’s unpiloted ATV with the Advanced Platform for Exploration. Backers see a more versatile unpiloted spacecraft in APEX, one that could re-fuel satellites; collect orbital debris or place the junk in a grave yard orbit; and participate in a Mars sample return mission as well as deliver supplies to the International Space Station. However, the development appears to rely on a diversion of ESA funds owed to NASA. http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2046/1

5. From Secrecy News via Space News: Steward Nozette, an acclaimed scientist for NASA, the Department of Energy and the National Space Council, faces a 13-year prison sentence for his willingness to sell classified information to an undercover FBI agent posing as an Israeli intelligence officer. Sentencing is set for U. S. District Court in Washington D. C. on Wednesday. http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/2012/03/nozette_sentence.html

6. From Space.com: Studies using NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter suggest cosmic rays striking the moon change the chemistry of the surface. Oxygen, liberated from water molecules, for instance, is free to merge with carbon to form pre-biotic molecules. http://www.space.com/14955-cosmic-rays-moon-space-radiation.html

Brought to you by the Coalition for Space Exploration, CSExtra is a daily compilation of space industry news selected from hundreds of online media resources. The Coalition is not the author or reporter of any of the stories appearing in CSExtra and does not control and is not responsible for the content of any of these stories. The content available through CSExtra contains links to other websites and domains which are wholly independent of the Coalition, and the Coalition makes no representation or warranty as to the accuracy, completeness or authenticity of the information contained in any such site or domain and does not pre-screen or approve any content. The Coalition does not endorse or receive any type of compensation from the included media outlets and is not responsible or liable in any way for any content of CSExtra or for any loss, damage or injury incurred as a result of any content appearing in CSExtra. For information on the Coalition, visit www.spacecoalition.com or contact us via e-mail at [email protected].